Eighteen Film Buffs Talk About The Scariest Movies They’ve Ever Seen
Even film critics watch these movies with the lights on.
The Seventh Victim
Jason Di Rosso, ABC TV/Radio National’s The Final Cut
For me there’s nothing as scary as an oldie. I’m still creeped out by seeing the sky through a dead man’s eyes in Carl Theodor Dreyer’s Vampyr (1932), or the bridal veil spilling out of a closed casket in Jean Epstein’s The Fall of the House of Usher (1928).
But The Seventh Victim (1943), from low-budget horror producer Val Lewtown and director Mark Robson, is my favourite. The macabre story of a young woman who uncovers a satanic cult while looking for her missing sister, it has a sparseness and menace that pre-empts David Lynch’s oeuvre, plus the gothic chic of Jean Brooks. An iconic shot of her holding a finger to her lips is truly unsettling.